The news just in that Eric Carmen, one of the greatest of all Brian’s disciples, died in his sleep this weekend age 74, RIP

Just looked at Instagram and there are some photos of Mike and David at Chiller Theater, plus over a dozen of Carnie - who celebrated her birthday at the convention.

John Cowsill was the drummer at the tribute for the Rascals’ Dino Danelli last night at the Cutting Room in NYC. Eddie Brigati sang some numbers and Gene Cornish attended, but apparently Felix Cavaliere was absent.

Are you sure it was Felix that was absent, not Eddie? Felix and Gene have been doing some work together recently. Eddie doesn't want to be a part of it.

Eddie was onstage, several photos of him at event on FB. Also pics of Gene looking reasonably good, but he took a bow from the audience and didn’t play. Pretty impressive lineup of drummers besides John: Corky Laing, Steve Jordan, Simon Kirke, Dennis Diken. Paul Shaffer on keys. Will Lee and even the Alessi brothers.

John Cowsill was the drummer at the tribute for the Rascals’ Dino Danelli last night at the Cutting Room in NYC. Eddie Brigati sang some numbers and Gene Cornish attended, but apparently Felix Cavaliere was absent.

https://youtu.be/_04Gj6kvz24

I don’t think it’s been mentioned on the board but a few months back, by way of marking both the 55th anniversary of Song Cycle’s release and his 80th birthday, Van Dyke did a podcast, over an hour and a half long, where he and Richard Henderson who wrote the 33 1/3 book on the album discussed its making, track by track, going into more detail about the process of its writing and recording than I can remember him doing in any previous interview. He also talks about his pre-SC career a little, focusing a bit more on his MGM era than on Smile. Besides the YT link above the podcast can be found at Apple and the other usual suspects.

The Chiller Theater convention is actually next weekend, April 28 to 30. Interestingly, Carnie Wilson will be there Fri and Sat too. Mike and David are top-billed, above Priscilla Presley.

 The convention’s site refers to Mike as making a “super rare” appearance. Usually, if a Chiller guest has never appeared at a signing show before the site will play that up, but it may be that Chiller’s people decided against saying it was Mike’s signing-show debut because there are dozens or maybe hundreds of these shows going back close to 30 years, and if a guest is mistakenly billed as making such a debut someone will point that out later.

Some other musical notables there will include some members of the Blues Brothers band (the living members that were in the first movie minus Steve Cropper, plus Tom Scott who was in the band initially but left before filming); Jimmy Hart, who will attend in his capacity as wrestling legend but I guess will be happy to sign his old Gentrys records; and Bebe Buell, who according to the site will sign musical items - that is, her records as a singer - as well as photos.

From Mike Stax of the Ugly Things zine the sad news that a sudden attack of meningitis has taken Jeff Beck. Whether or not you think his tour with Brian was an interesting experiment or a mismatch or maybe even a success, no denying the enormous degree to which he expanded the possibilities of the electric guitar. I stood 15 feet from him at his Louisville show in ‘76 and the word phenomenal is what comes to mind all these years later. RIP

Yes, VDP has reached what the Gettysburg Address calls four score. May he see some score more!

By way of comparison Rolling Stone’s earlier list

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/100-greatest-singers-of-all-time-147019/aretha-franklin-6-227696/

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-singers-all-time-1234642307/

Rolling Stone’s done another list of the greatest singers of all time - pointing out in the intro that the criteria used to determine greatest singer are different from those used to decide the greatest technically proficient vocalists.

The last time the magazine put together such a list, a dozen years ago, it was 100 greatest; now it’s 200 greatest.

Much more so than was the case in the previous list, non-rock singers are included. For example, Om Khalsoum, the great Egyptian singer is on it, and so is Ofra Haza.

Brian is at number 57 and Carl is not included.

Very remarkably, Joe Cocker, who certainly would have been in the top ten or at least 20 if Rolling Stone had done an issue like this in the 1970s, isn’t included at all. He was number 98 in the earlier list of 100.

Harry Nilsson is another fine singer not in the list.

Happy Birthday Brian!

Sorry about starting the thread twice but at first I got an error message and I tried it again.

It’s interesting to compare the 125 smackeroos Mike charges to what others charge. Carnie asks for $75, Neil Sedaka for $399, Debbie Gibson $250, for example.

https://www.cameo.com/mikeloveofcl?utm_medium=owned-crm&utm_source=email&utm_audience=customer&utm_type=singlesend&utm_subtype=newtalent&utm_drip=email&j=9c2fa43a1933572e9589028d16b99eaa&utm_campaign=210420%3ACus%3AHEng%3ACRM%3ANewTalent%3ALonzoBall&sub=5dfb106e577acd01839489e1&fbclid=IwAR22lK7fXnr2_1ticbTeupJCUl3-wV-fLkIfhk7h3XbnBtKSFU9t-_gCf5g

I think we all could see this coming but the question is who’ll be next in the band to sign with the personalized greeting service?

https://www.cameo.com/mikeloveofcl?utm_medium=owned-crm&utm_source=email&utm_audience=customer&utm_type=singlesend&utm_subtype=newtalent&utm_drip=email&j=9c2fa43a1933572e9589028d16b99eaa&utm_campaign=210420%3ACus%3AHEng%3ACRM%3ANewTalent%3ALonzoBall&sub=5dfb106e577acd01839489e1&fbclid=IwAR22lK7fXnr2_1ticbTeupJCUl3-wV-fLkIfhk7h3XbnBtKSFU9t-_gCf5g

I think we all could see this coming but the question is who’ll be next in the band to sign with the personalized greeting service?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1971-Beach-Boys-Dennis-Wilson-hand-written-note-to-Dad-I-Owe-You-50-cash/143730306492?hash=item2176fe6dbc:g:ExYAAOSwUyZfWkzw

Rockaway Records which often sells curious memorabilia on Ebay and its own site has come up with a dilly this time: a note in longhand from Dennis agreeing to repay a $50 loan from “Dad” at Bri-Mur publishing, as an advance for “See Spot Run Prod. Co.”

Mountvernonandfairway.de in its miscellaneous topics page lists the five songs published by Bri-Mur: "Break Away," "Soulful Old Man Sunshine," "Shyin' Away" and two Dennis songs from 1971, "Behold the Night" and "It's New Day." The document is dated 1971 and the handwriting is quite recognizably Dennis’ so it looks authentic... but what See Spot Run was and how it connected to Dennis’ songwriting at that point I don’t know.

Thought about putting this in On Topic since he was after all Hawthorne’s leading musical visionary not named Wilson....but anyway word has come that Emitt Rhodes died peacefully this afternoon, age 70, RIP.

At the 46:45 mark a teamup for the ages, the Quasar of Rock...and Van Dyke Parks...
https://youtu.be/Y7d16oTJ7yQ

- at the 11:47 mark:

https://youtu.be/3NbQkyvbw18

I think this is the first time any of the guys have been referred to by name in a Dylan tune...unless he’s got one still on the cab discussing Mike’s Rock’n’roll Hall of Fame remarks....

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18&feature=youtu.be

At the stroke of midnight Bob Dylan released this very long murder ballad. Not quite as multifaceted as Desolation Row, not quite as melodic as Phil Ochs’ song on the same subject Crucifixion, but, as Bob says on Twitter, his fans “may find it interesting.” Whether this has been sitting around for a while or whether Bob just thought he’d make one last big statement in case covid-19 got him, who knows? Anyway there ‘tis....

A quick reminder, or notice if you haven’t heard yet, that on Saturday Feb 29 at the Alex Theatre in Glendale just north if LA there will be a benefit show in the Wild Honey series which raises funds for an autism nonprofit. Each show focuses on a particular artist or sometimes album. The featured artist this time is the Lovin’ Spoonful. Early on Steve Boone and Joe Butler agreed to appear....then when John Sebastian got word of the show he agreed to perform with them, for the first time since the Spoonful reunited 20 years ago at their Rock ‘n’Roll Hall of Fame induction not long before Zal Yanovsky’s death.

Besides the Spoonful’s set various musicians of note will be playing, from Micky Dolenz, Moby Grape’s Peter Lewis and Dave Alvin on down. Carnie Wilson will be representing our guys there. A few dozen seats in the balcony are still available at $30 but since Rolling Stone’s site just did an article on this show you’d better move quick if you want to attend.

Further info at

https://alextheatre.org/event/wild-honey-foundation-presents-wild-honey-orchestra-lovin-spoonful-autism-benefit

and a list of artists performing is at

http://glendalearts.org/event/wild-honey-foundation-presents-wild-honey-orchestra-celebrates-the-lovin-spoonful-to-benefit-the-autism-think-tank/

If you’re not an Amazon Prime subscriber, Seconds can be seen for free here:

https://archive.org/details/John.Frankenheimer..Seconds.1966angeeParaZoowoman.website

Fast forward to the 20 minute mark if you want to start at the point Brian walked in to see it.... though I should add that even when seen from the beginning this is uneasy viewing and if watched after dark preferably should not be seen alone.

I’ve discussed Seconds a bit in other topic threads about the movie here so will just note, again, that the casting of two actors playing the same person naturally brings Love and Mercy to mind though I don’t know if Bill Pohlad had seen this film before deciding to use two actors to play Brian. That said there are definite similarities between the second half of L&M and the second and third “acts” of Seconds....

Kim Shattuck, who first gained notice as a member of the Pandoras and later led the pop/punk band the Muffs, died this morning in LA at the age of 56 after a two year battle with ALS aka Lou Gehrig’s disease.

As a rocker and a screamer she was second to none. The first two Muffs albums hold up as well as just about anything released in the 90s. But sometimes her songwriting displayed a gentler and occasionally BB’s influenced side. That was probably why she and her Muffs bandmates appeared at one of the Wild Honey shows in LA some years ago and performed this:

https://youtu.be/IHj8wKXiLR0

Seeing Kim taking on one of the most complicated Brian melodies is a little startling and though she might have done better tearing through, say, Little Honda, there’s something gentle and childlike in her delivery that fits in. She’ll be missed.

https://www.estatesales.net/CA/Santa-Monica/90405/2264232

Dusting off this thread because this Saturday and Sunday at the late Gary Stewart’s Mar Vista home there’s a sale of all his belongings (except for his gigantic vinyl/CD/tape collection which was bequeathed to his Rhino store colleague Jeff Gold). Items include his huge collection of books (which would have many out of print and extremely collectible music related titles), his countless x-large Hawaiian shirts, lots of DVDs and VHS tapes, tons of promotional swag from T shirts down to badges, potted plants...and his bike. Proceeds go to his favorite charities. Further details and photos at the link above.

On Facebook a few minutes ago a friend of Nick Walusko aka Nicky Wonder reported that he has just died in Buffalo. RIP. I suppose this means the show tonight won’t go on....but no definite word yet...

https://www.laweekly.com/music-pick-sofia-bolt/

Don’t think it’s been mentioned here that next Monday night July 15, Van Dyke performs with Sofia Bolt in LA; info at the link above. It’s been about four years since he was onstage and on his Twitter feed he promised to offer his usual peppery opinions between songs so it should be worth checking out.